Prioritization of combinatorial test cases by incremental interaction coverage
Combinatorial testing is a well-recognized testing method, and has been widely applied in practice. To facilitate analysis, a common approach is to assume that all test cases in a combinatorial test suite have the same fault detection capability. However, when testing resources are limited, the orde...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
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World Scientific Publishing
2013
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| Online Access: | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/51844/ |
| _version_ | 1848798587122614272 |
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| author | Huang, Rubing Xie, Xiaodong Towey, Dave Chen, Tsong Yueh Lu, Yansheng Chen, Jinfu |
| author_facet | Huang, Rubing Xie, Xiaodong Towey, Dave Chen, Tsong Yueh Lu, Yansheng Chen, Jinfu |
| author_sort | Huang, Rubing |
| building | Nottingham Research Data Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | Combinatorial testing is a well-recognized testing method, and has been widely applied in practice. To facilitate analysis, a common approach is to assume that all test cases in a combinatorial test suite have the same fault detection capability. However, when testing resources are limited, the order of executing the test cases is critical. To improve testing cost-effectiveness, prioritization of combinatorial test cases is employed. The most popular approach is based on interaction coverage, which prioritizes combinatorial test cases by repeatedly choosing an unexecuted test case that covers the largest number on uncovered parameter value combinations of a given strength (level of interaction among parameters). However, this approach suffers from some drawbacks. Based on previous observations that the majority of faults in practical systems can usually be triggered with parameter interactions of small strengths, we propose a new strategy of prioritizing combinatorial test cases by incrementally adjusting the strength values. Experimental results show that our method performs better than the random prioritization technique and the technique of prioritizing combinatorial test suites according to test case generation order, and has better performance than the interaction-coverage-based test prioritization technique in most cases. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T20:22:08Z |
| format | Article |
| id | nottingham-51844 |
| institution | University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T20:22:08Z |
| publishDate | 2013 |
| publisher | World Scientific Publishing |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | nottingham-518442020-05-04T16:39:33Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/51844/ Prioritization of combinatorial test cases by incremental interaction coverage Huang, Rubing Xie, Xiaodong Towey, Dave Chen, Tsong Yueh Lu, Yansheng Chen, Jinfu Combinatorial testing is a well-recognized testing method, and has been widely applied in practice. To facilitate analysis, a common approach is to assume that all test cases in a combinatorial test suite have the same fault detection capability. However, when testing resources are limited, the order of executing the test cases is critical. To improve testing cost-effectiveness, prioritization of combinatorial test cases is employed. The most popular approach is based on interaction coverage, which prioritizes combinatorial test cases by repeatedly choosing an unexecuted test case that covers the largest number on uncovered parameter value combinations of a given strength (level of interaction among parameters). However, this approach suffers from some drawbacks. Based on previous observations that the majority of faults in practical systems can usually be triggered with parameter interactions of small strengths, we propose a new strategy of prioritizing combinatorial test cases by incrementally adjusting the strength values. Experimental results show that our method performs better than the random prioritization technique and the technique of prioritizing combinatorial test suites according to test case generation order, and has better performance than the interaction-coverage-based test prioritization technique in most cases. World Scientific Publishing 2013-12-01 Article PeerReviewed Huang, Rubing, Xie, Xiaodong, Towey, Dave, Chen, Tsong Yueh, Lu, Yansheng and Chen, Jinfu (2013) Prioritization of combinatorial test cases by incremental interaction coverage. International Journal of Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering, 23 (10). pp. 1427-1457. ISSN 0218-1940 Software testing; combinatorial testing; test case prioritization; interaction coverage; incremental interaction coverage; algorithm https://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S0218194013500459 doi:10.1142/S0218194013500459 doi:10.1142/S0218194013500459 |
| spellingShingle | Software testing; combinatorial testing; test case prioritization; interaction coverage; incremental interaction coverage; algorithm Huang, Rubing Xie, Xiaodong Towey, Dave Chen, Tsong Yueh Lu, Yansheng Chen, Jinfu Prioritization of combinatorial test cases by incremental interaction coverage |
| title | Prioritization of combinatorial test cases by incremental interaction coverage |
| title_full | Prioritization of combinatorial test cases by incremental interaction coverage |
| title_fullStr | Prioritization of combinatorial test cases by incremental interaction coverage |
| title_full_unstemmed | Prioritization of combinatorial test cases by incremental interaction coverage |
| title_short | Prioritization of combinatorial test cases by incremental interaction coverage |
| title_sort | prioritization of combinatorial test cases by incremental interaction coverage |
| topic | Software testing; combinatorial testing; test case prioritization; interaction coverage; incremental interaction coverage; algorithm |
| url | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/51844/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/51844/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/51844/ |